Today, Pokemon celebrates the twentieth anniversary of the franchises' first appearance in Japan. It's hard to imagine a phenomenon began on a humble GameBoy cartridge. In two decades, Pokemon has become nearly as iconic for our generation as Mickey Mouse was for generations before us. Nintendo's sold hundred of millions of video games, and the Pokemon trading cards have been distributed in the billions. The TV show is still on the air.

This video, above, is a handy timeline of the franchise’s success. The original Pokemon games, Pokemon Red, Pokemon Blue, and Pokemon Yellow are now available on the Nintendo eShop for the Nintendo 3DS.

READ MORE: Polygon's chronological history of Pokemon games